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Apr 03, 2019 Web Exclusive By James Thornhill

Yves Jarvis doesn’t need you to understand him or his music. Previously as Un Blonde, the Montreal-based maverick (born Jean-Sebastian Audet) wove tunes from arch post-punk and glitch-filled electronic funk. Now he’s transformed his persona and released The Same But By Different Means, the start of a new era expanding on his genre-hopping explorations of the past.

The styles here are as interchangeable as his identity. Using a cut and paste aesthetic Audet builds short, sonic vignettes from fragments of smooth jazz, folk noir, and romantic RnB all connected through electronic, dub echoes.

It’s an enthralling and surprising listen from the subdued organ-driven soul engulfed in post-rock noise that is opener “To Say That is Easy,” to the Dylan-does-dub-funk workout of “Sugar Coated.” Frenzied rare groove banger “That Don’t Make It So” is as fresh a take on jazz as you’ll hear all year.

This album is a very modern “jazz” album for our post-everything culture, coming from the same Afro-futuristic camp as Thundercat and Kendrick Lamar. (www.yvesjarvis.com)

Author rating: 7/10